INTERNATIONAL triathlete Jesse Featonby has made a one-act affair of the Cumberoona run.
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And while the Australian representative may have been racing the clock in the run along the Murray River, it will also be a race against time in a bid to be on the start line for the first round of the World Cup at Mooloolaba in two weeks.
Featonby fell in the bike leg of a Oceania Championships in Tasmania last week and was still wearing bandages on his shoulder as he prepared for yesterday’s event.
“I haven’t been able to swim for a week, I can’t rotate the shoulder just yet,” he said.
“I had a nasty crash on the first leg of the bike and it’s been a bit frustrating since then — hopefully this week I start swimming and then I have the first of the world cup events where I’ve been selected for the Australian team in the first two and they are only a week apart.
“It was a slow speed crash where I came over hit my hand and that is still sore and then landed on my right side.
“They think it’s cartilage damage to the shoulder and every time I swing my arm over it’s bone on bone.
“But this morning was a nice run, despite the humidity, and it’s the first time I’ve started in the Cumberoona run.
“It was good to have a hit out and I’ve never run this race before so it is nice to have a run in a local event and particularly after missing out on the City2City last week.”
Featonby finished the 8 kilometre course in 25 minutes, 28 seconds, almost four minutes ahead of under-20 winner and second across the line Sean Heiner-Hennessy.
In the women’s it was another Cumberoona debutant Belinda Ralph, who chalked up her first win in competitive running.
The Rex flight attendant runs for fitness but yesterday was just her fourth race.
“I just decided to give it a go after running four to five days a week,” she said.
“Last week I finished seventh in the women in the City2City, I had a run at Corowa a couple of weeks before that and the Blackmores Run back in September.”
About 100 starters braved the humid conditions at Noreuil Park yesterday with Caitlyn Regan making it a double in the juniors having won the City2City a week earlier and the under-16 girls yesterday.